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Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Daring Girls: The Importance of Handwritten Letters

Hello all,

It is time once again for another Daring Girls post! Today I'll be sharing about handwriting. (It's origins, tools used, cursive writing, etc.)

When I saw this topic for today, I wasn't too thrilled. For one thing I HATE my handwriting. It's the one thing I hate about writing to my pen pals. I wish that I had a more attractive handwriting, but I have to deal with the one I have. Growing up, I had a little trouble with holding a pencil correctly. I had to use one of those things that you put on the pencils, to remind you how to hold one. It was slightly embarrassing, but it was better than the blisters that were developing on my thumb. :( I also had a teacher that was pretty horrible to me about my cursive handwriting, instead of seeing that cursive was just not my forte. She was very mean and unprofessional with me, to this day I do not write in cursive except to sign my name. So now that you know my history on the topic, let's move on to the actual history itself.

Originally posted fromwww.caretoclick.com

I'm sure you all are familiar with the primitive tools used to write the early cave drawings. They were stone-like in appearance and told us all of a world that we knew nothing about. It's quite fascinating that these people thought to record history that would be passed on to generation after generation. The skills evolved over time, but it wasn't until many years later that a Greek scholar, named Cadmus, developed the Phoenician alphabet. He was also said to develop the first letters written by hand on paper. He started the first group of letter writers! Pretty fantastic and fascinating for a letter writer, like me! ;)

Cursive writing was started by Aldus Manutius, a fifteenth-century printer from Venice, he actually has a typeface named after him, "Aldus." Check it out! Cursive writing was encouraged because the writer could write more quickly and it took up less space. Also if done correctly, it looked more put together and uniform. Handwriting has quickly taken a back seat to technology, but is still an important part of education. Children are still taught handwriting and cursive writing to this day. There are even various styles of cursive taught.

Today I'll leave you with this haiku, written by eighteenth-century Japanese poet Issa. I love that the book says, "[It's] a nice reminder of both the gradual evolution of human writing and the sometimes painstaking pace good penmanship requires.

Little snailInch by inch, climbMount Fuji!
Thoughts on this post?

All information and research for this post was gathered from The Daring Book for Girls.

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About Me

I'm happily married to my best friend. We have spent 7 amazing years together, 4 married. We are the proud parents to the cutest baby boy...we are not at all biased! ;) And the sweetest fur baby, Sophie!